HOUR-BY-HOUR, WHAT’S HAPPENING ACROSS BRITAIN
06.00
Bagpipes will be played at more than 2,000 locations across the country and around the world, from New Zealand to Somalia, and spanning every Commonwealth country. Pipers will play Battle’s O’er – a haunting tune traditionally played at the end of battles.
11.00
A Remembrance Service takes place at the Cenotaph, where Royals and politicians will lay wreaths after the twominute silence. Prince Charles – who performed the duty last year, right – is expected to lay the first Royal tribute. MPs will then lay theirs. German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier will also lay a wreath, the first time Germany has taken part in the event. Remembrance services will also be held at the Cenotaph in Glasgow’s George Square, Edinburgh City Chambers and Cavell Gardens, Inverness.
11.30
At low tide on 32 beaches around the British Isles, large-scale portraits of a First World War casualty will be drawn into the sand. As the tide comes in, the water will wash away the faces in a poignant tribute. Poet Wilfred Owen’s portrait will be drawn into Folkestone’s Sunny Sands. Danny Boyle, the film-maker also behind the 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony, is overseeing the project.
12.30
The centrepiece of the commemorations will be a People’s Procession. A total 10,000 members of the public, chosen by lottery, will file past the Cenotaph, having started at Buckingham Palace (see map). Six bands will play accompanying music. The event, to be screened live on BBC1, has echoes of November 1920, above, when the current Cenotaph was unveiled, and a million people flooded past.
12.30
Bells will sound across the country to replicate the relief in 1918 when long-silent bells rang out. In London, Westminster Abbey, St Paul’s Cathedral and Big Ben will chime. Portsmouth Cathedral will ring 7,000 changes in five hours, representing the number of people from the city who were killed in action.
13.45
In Edinburgh, a free concert will take place at the site of the former Craiglockhart Military Hospital, where officers were treated for shell-shock. There will be fiddlers and a symphony orchestra, and school pupils will recite the poems of Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon, who were treated here. Many other cities, towns and villages will hold memorial concerts during the day.
16.00
Scotland’s national memorial service will be held at Glasgow Cathedral. The Princess Royal will attend, along with First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. Musicians will include the Pipe Bands of Police Scotland.
17.00
At the Tower of London, 10,000 torches will be lit, gradually filling the moat with a sea of flames. Beefeaters will light the first flames, with volunteers doing the rest. The circle of light is designed by one of the men behind the 2014 display of 888,246 ceramic poppies outside the Tower. The same display will have burned from 5pm to 9pm all week.
18.00
An invitation-only memorial service at Westminster Abbey will be attended by the Queen, Prime Minister, other Royals, MPs, and representatives of nations from both sides in the war. The service will be live on BBC1.
18.55
As the evening draws in, more than 1,200 buglers at locations across the country will play The Last Post. They have been organised by Bruno Peek, the renowned pageant master behind national celebrations such as the Queen’s Golden Jubilee in 2002. He has been planning the nationwide commemorations for four years.
19.00
An estimated 1,300 beacons will be lit from Unst, the most northerly inhabited island in Scotland, to Cornwall in the south, and from St David’s, the most westerly city in Wales, to Lowestoft, the most easterly town in England. Some, such as the one in Shipston-on-Stour, Warwickshire, pictured, will be bonfires, others will be torches on wooden poles.
19.05
As the torches blaze, bells again will ring out in 1,300 churches across the country. Organiser Bruno Peek says the display symbolises ‘the light of hope that emerged from the darkness of war’.
19.05
In a final flourish to the day, 180 town criers nationwide will perform a ‘cry for peace around the world’. It will be led by Leo Tighe BEM, a Chelsea Pensioner.